the trees witness and weep

Mars: 2439

Green, green, green. When I opened my eyes, everything was green. I don’t know how long I’ve been here, but there is moss growing on my jacket, and flowers are growing through the mess of my hair spread out above me. It’s so green here, I can’t see the sky. Maybe that’s why my last rev decided to come here—to escape the sky. Here, in whatever forest this is (I could find out if I connected my uplink but for some reason I don’t feel ready to do that) you could forget that there is a sky above you, the tree canopy is so thick. I lift my right arm straight up and out and flex my fingers. The bytes under my skin hear the call and rise to the surface, forming the tip of something, but I quickly calm them and they fall back under the surface. No proof of their existence left on my skin except for the black ink of what most humans think is a tattoo.

I feel calm, and peaceful; I want to savor it—for some reason I seem to know that once I begin following the rev startup procedures, I won’t feel so peaceful anymore.

So I take in the slight breeze in the air, the way it ruffles the leaves of branches high above me. I try to count just how many shades of green I see. I think about how my body feels, scanning it from head to toe in my mind, noting where it creaks, and where it sighs in relief, where it yearns to be moving, and the bits that want to stay still a moment longer.

I feel the earth beneath me, and I thank it for this resting place.

Finally, I can’t hold off any longer. I open the uplink, start downloading memory banks, and squeeze my eyes shut against the flood of feelings and sense memory that crashes in waves over me.

I’m shaking. My fingers won’t steady. I’m squeezing my eyes shut so tight that it’s beginning to hurt.

The memory file smoothes out, slows to a familiar pace in the background of my processor. I see a blinking indicator on my vis that means I have messages. I open the inbox. 412 messages. I must have gone off grid for a long time in my last rev.

There are a few from offworlders—mostly other 4th gen borgs, a few job offers, and several from Bones. 369 of them are from Gypsophila. Most of them are just her random updates on her life, about 40 of them are increasingly concerned and irritated messages wondering where I am. Bones seems unconcerned about my whereabouts but is irritated that I fell through on a job he needed me for.

The private satellites that all borgs connect to (the new human collectives didn’t want us connected to theirs—most borgs respected that wish, tho unknown to the humans, we can still connect to them, we just choose not to) ping in on my location. I’m in the m’hatha forest—what used to be the amazon rainforest.

The bytes under my skin itch to be used. I refuse them; even though using my fingers to untangle my hair from the earth takes ten times longer than if i let the bytes sort it out.

It’s a long walk to Sota, but my legs ache to be stretched out and used.

The itch on my back turns to a low fire, the bytes racing around hoping I’ll call on them. I don’t.

It takes me four weeks to travel, mostly on foot, to Sota. When I walk into Juantcha’s, Bones is sitting where he does every single afternoon, on the third seat from the end of the bar, across from his favorite top shelf tequila. Juantcha is one of the only bar owners who mostly ignore the human consumption regulations in regards to borgs. Public human consumption of altering substances is regulated to certain amounts allocated by substance; all borgs who chose to stay earthside have to abide by human regulations of whatever locality they’re in. Unfortunately for borgs who like to consume—the human regulation limits are about one fifth of the average borgs tolerance.

But certain spots like Juantcha’s will ignore those limits for borgs like Bones—borgs that saved innumerable lives during the bloody global earth revolution. It helps that borgs pay for their substances, unlike most humans who have credit allowances for those things. Earlybird sits on Bones right side, face close to the bar, a line of cocaine in front of zer nose. Ze sniffs it up so quickly and cleanly and is sitting and staring in my direction so fast that I almost missed the whole thing.

“Mars! God I haven’t seen you in… well I just saw you in 2049,” Earlybird glitches out for a few seconds, “but that was hundreds of years ago wasn’t it? I haven’t SEEN you seen you in like 50 years! Where did you go last rev??”

Bones rolls his eyes, throws back his tequila. “You’re a real son of a bitch Mars. You couldn’t even open your messages?”

I sit down next to Bones.

“Juantcha! Can I get a bottle of Bones’ tequila please? On my tab? Hey Earlybird, you’re right it’s been about 50 years since the last time we saw each other on earth chronology.”

Bones is staring at me. I stare back for a minute.

“He just wanted to turn it off Bones. The last rev was really tired. More tired than the rest of us have ever been, I think. He had moss growing on him.”

Bones shakes his head. “Where the hell did he go?”

“I woke up in the middle of M’hatha. I had to fucking climb the Cordillera to get back. I think he thought that when I woke up.. that none of his future revs would be able to feel differently than he did. I think.. i think he was burying himself Bones.”

He throws back another two fingers of tequila. “Fuck man.”

“yeah. Where’s gypsophila? she sent me like 400 messages but she stopped a couple months ago.”

“she didn’t tell you? she went offworld man. She’s got a mod to sneak onto a carrier. She’s halfway through the galaxy by now.”

“a mod? why would she want to go out there with those asshead explorers?”

Bones rolls his eyes, Earlybird laughs.

“when will you stop being convinced that they’re trying to be the new colonizers? Their regulations are airtight. Besides don’t act like you haven’t known for 200 years that Gypso was only staying earthside for you. She’s been talking about the explorations for decades man. Not that you’d know.”

His jab stung but he wasn’t wrong.

My last rev had been tired of existing; all his memories finished downloading last week, and they were bleak. He spent almost half of his rev laying in that forest, feeling emptiness and despair.

“She’s gone? for how long?”

“Well she’ll only be able to use that mod for a human cycle so about 120 years. Then she’ll have to find her own way back. The humans won’t be happy to help her once they find out she scammed their regulatory systems.”

Earlybird has ordered another line of coke and is sniffling as we say goodbye.

“see you in another 50 years mars!”

“EB you’re quantum jumping so often you’ll probably see me 100 years ago tomorrow.”

Ze laughs, Bones throws a hand in the air, then clasps his fist to his chest in the colloquial greeting and goodbye of the borg. I do the same, and walk out of the bar into the wide world, with absolutely nowhere to go.

THE SCYBORG CENSUS, 2047

in order of generation, then class

FIRST GEN—

Bones; medic; given name doc—activated on mar 19 2033; fully robotic arms and spine, eye implants, chest implants, cerebral implants 
Cash; pilot; given name pilot—activated on nov 1 2033; fully robotic legs and hands; facial implants, cerebral implants 
Cabel; tank; given name tank—activated on jul 20 2033, destroyed on may 4 2042; fully robotic body with organic materials implanted into robotic spinal cord. remains are located in hall of the fallen, earthside. 
ami; first gen armory; given name, bullet—activated on ril 2 2033; robotic limbs, uncountable implants 
Shwe; covert; given name, widow—activated on may 29 2033; no visible implants 
Gilles; sniper; given name, rifle—activated on dec 3 2033; 
Mango; captain; given name, cap—activated on mar 28 2033, destroyed sep 9 2052;

SECOND GEN—

zalve;
poc;
uixi;
marc;
cherie;
sin;
wok;

THIRD GEN—

qwe-gk-limacho;
swa-pk-oino;
ght-tk-trevinki;
pli-gk-huwtre;
kpo-wk-erdyciese;
jty-tk-dewabyo;
nwu-wk-gimana;

FOURTH GEN—

chow
mars
clovr 
temo 
moss
yellow
pire

FIFTH GEN—

SIXTH GEN—

SEVENTH GEN—

EIGHTH GEN—

NINTH GEN—

quantum gen

eleventh gen

MARS: 2047

“you’ve signed all the paperwork?”

the doctor glanced over at the newest volunteer subject, as he shook the vial in his hand and watched the tiny little nanobytes swim in the plasma gel keeping them alive.

“yes sir. i confirmed with the…secretary? out front?”

“No need to call me sir. Dr. Stein will do fine, for now.”

“sure, doctor stein.”

“there’s no need to be nervous. did you read the briefing on the transition process? you understand there will be pain, discomfort, psychological changes as well as the physical changes?”

“Yes. I’m prepared.”

“I promise you, you are not, but you’re sacrifice will be worth everything you experience and more.”

The subject shook their head in acknowledgment. They were right to be nervous; of the three subjects already in generation four, only one had recovered from the trauma of the changes so far. Such was the price of scientific experimentation. The others would recover, given time, and treatment.

“First, I will start a series of injections to prepare your body for the eventual injection of nanotechnology. You will have a series of surgeries to implant your foundational upgrades, including the spinal and nervous system adjustments you will need to be able to communicate with your nanobytes. Finally, there will be a series of injections of nanobytes, and a series of tests to check their performance. You will go the recovery wing after that, then training. This is a very, very long process—you understand?”

“yes doctor stein. i understand.”

“alright then, let’s begin.”

The wings spanned the length of the operating room, flexing and stretching for the first time. The subject lay unconscious on the table, the wings protruding from their back.

The nanobytes that the wings were made of swarmed over one another, their magnetic force creating an almost indestructible material.

The doctor was taking notes. Two of the nurses who had been with the doctor the longest were already cleaning up the operation room and prepping the subject for the recovery wing. Everyone else stood in shock and awe, staring at the wings.

Until the doctor pressed something near the table and they collapsed like a waterfall back into the subjects skin. They lay still, looking like nothing more than a fresh tattoo across the subjects back and shoulders and upper arms and chest.

The doctor finally looked up from his notes, smiling proudly.

“I think I’ll call him… falcon.”

“They woke up screaming like this, doctor. What should we do? Sedate them?”

Falcon was inside a glass domed room in the recovery wing that was soundproof; they were thrashing against the restraints on their arms and legs—there were scratches from their shoulders to their wrists where they had dug into their own skin with their nails. The doctor shook his head.

“no. no sedation until the morning, you know the rules. just let him tire himself out.”

The nurse looked at the doctor incredulously but she knew better than to question his decisions once he’d spoken them.

The subject didn’t settle down before their morning sedation. They screamed all night. The nurse determined that next time it would be better to ask the doctors forgiveness than permission: next time she would simply sedate them.

Over the following months, the nurse genevieve and the subject called the falcon became acquaintances and friends of a sort. She always did her best to get them extra pain meds, extra sedation. She stayed longer hours to sit with them and hold their hand or distract them. She listened as they described the pain and discomfort, as they wept.

She would tell them bits and pieces of what was happening in the world. Demonstrations that had gone down—police and military assaults of occupiers and barricades across the world. The ongoing international conflicts that had arisen from the US government’s unwillingness to let go of their imperial interests in other nations resources. She wasn’t really supposed to tell them much about the outside. they were meant to be focusing on their recovery. But she had noticed a direct correlation between how often she distracted them and gave them news, and how often they had flare ups and breakdowns. They did better at their physical therapy and training when she had snuck in a picnic the night before and watched old movies with them. They slept better if she sat and read a book aloud as their nightly sedation took hold.

They were wary of anyone who took orders from the doctor—the arbiter of their pain and suffering these long months—but they liked her being there as much as she liked being there.

but all too soon, the friendship between the human nurse Genevieve and the newly born scyborg called falcon that she has nicknamed mars, would end. 
because in six short months, mars would be in the field fulfilling their contractual commitments and fighting a revolution and genevieve would be all but gone—another subject in the revolving doors of the recovery wing.